


the backside of the world

by unfinishedidea



Category: Sunshine (2007)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Ensemble Cast, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-23
Updated: 2013-12-23
Packaged: 2018-01-05 16:55:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1096314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unfinishedidea/pseuds/unfinishedidea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>We're more than stardust.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the backside of the world

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lastingdreams](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lastingdreams/gifts).



> I had a lot of fun writing this -- be warned, my grasp of astronaut training/sci-fi science is very shaky, so please read with a certain suspension of disbelief. Thanks for the great prompt, and I hope you enjoy, lastingdreams! I never thought I'd write a Nobody Dies AU for this fandom, but, well, I guess that's where my brain went. Happy Yuletide!

Ultimately, stars are just bright pinpricks of destruction, explosions and chemical chain reactions and pure energy, massive and luminous and beautiful against the backdrop of the void. Capa imagines that the others try not to think too hard about the fact that they’re hurtling thousands of miles per hour towards one. It’s probably terrifying for most people, but he can’t help but feel comforted. Life came from the sun, and death, and it’s the natural order of things.

***

Being in the top of their respective fields, they had all mostly heard of each other before the team was assembled, as one would expect if they were going to have the last hope of humanity resting on their shoulders. Capa isn’t surprised when early on in the team’s formation, Mace rolls his eyes and says, “I fucking hate icebreakers,” when the Team Cohesion Coordinator (also known as the Make Sure Everyone Plays Nice with Each Other/Glorified Babysitter) tries to get them to play Two Truths and a Lie.

Kaneda shrugs and instead they go to the nearest bar and get shit-faced drunk.

***

Capa stumbles into the kitchen of their shared quarters the next morning. Trey is poking listlessly at some eggs and bacon on the stove. Corazon is slumped over the breakfast bar, head buried in her arms. Capa manages to pour himself a cup of coffee without breaking anything. Trey tips his head and grunts at him in greeting, and adds more eggs and bacon to the pan, later splitting everything into three plates and putting the plates in front of them wordlessly.

Corazon groans and slumps up slightly. She eats the first bite, blinks, and then starts shoveling the food down. “This is good,” Corazon says.

Trey snorts. “You don’t have to look so surprised. I can cook white people hangover food with the best of them.”

***

They train together for twenty months, and even though sometimes Capa dreams that he goes on this journey alone, lonely and isolating and breathtaking, deep down he thinks that they couldn’t have gotten a better crew together and he’s glad for the company.

“Am I the only one who thinks it’s a bit arrogant to call her Icarus?” Cassie asks, the morning of their launch. “I can’t be the first. I mean, it’s a little bit like tempting fate. More than a little. Especially since her first incarnation failed.” 

Capa shrugs. “That’s a pretty accurate summation of humanity. ‘A bit arrogant. Likes to tempt fate.’”

“Point,” Cassie says.

***

Out of all of them, Capa thinks that Searle understands him the best. Partially because it’s his job to, and partially because Capa thinks that Searle has the same kind of reverence for the sun that he does, has the same appreciation for the intersection of science and wonder and sees the beauty in the universe. Searle also has an unhealthy interest in the sun’s light, but Capa can’t really talk. 

***

Capa overhears them talking from the balcony of the oxygen room, the garden, the one Searle jokingly calls Eden and Cory calls Penglai Shan. Kaneda always quirks his mouth when she does. Cory tells Cassie stories from her childhood, about the Eight Immortals and Sun Wukong and the real story of Mulan, the one not dressed up for kids, and Capa sits back and closes his eyes and listens. 

***

They all get their turn in the Earth Room—it’s to be expected. Floating through the void of deep space would get to anyone’s head. The modules are never of anything or anyone they actually know on Earth—Capa thinks it’s probably better that way, that they leave some space between what they left behind and where they are now, but he knows that it gets to some of them more than others. Capa’s also aware that he knows more about his fellow crew members than is probably appropriate, know things that should only be privy to Searle, knows that Harvey wishes that he could see his family, but instead makes do with the beach module, which shows kids running along the surf, and parents walking behind them, hand-in-hand, and dogs jumping into the waves.

As far as Capa knows, Kaneda only ever gets prescribed the Earth room once—mountains enshrouded in fog and a simple cabin and light refracting through dew. Capa never sees him go again.

Cory’s predictable; it’s only ever the forest for her. Tall, towering redwoods, or damp, misting jungles, but always a sea of green. 

Cassie likes to see people: children playing in a field, amusement parks, crowds watching fireworks at night, but sometimes she also watches the freezing winds over Antarctica, blowing over the ice at dawn. Capa gets cold just thinking about it.

Capa never goes into the Earth room—he never needs to. The metal walls of the payload focus him, calm him, in a way that nothing on earth ever did. He thinks that if he ever needed to, he’d like to see the wide open chasm of the ocean. He imagines deep sea creatures would look at home in the dark, vast abyss of space.

***

“‘Science will never explain—George Clooney’s musk’,” Cassie reads delightedly, and grins. “Yes please.” Harvey fistpumps.

“Oh, that’s not fair, Cassie’s crush on George Clooney can be seen from space. Literally,” Mace says, “And I totally saw Harvey palm that card from the deck.”

“Don’t be such a sore loser, Mace. Need I remind you that we’re playing a game called _Cards Against Humanity_ ,” Cassie says. “I think cheating is in the spirit of the game.”

“Icarus, do you think Harvey’s cheating?” Mace says.

“I feel that it is best if I remain neutral in this dispute,” Icarus broadcasts. 

“And that’s game point,” Harvey says smugly.

“Come on, Capa, Kaneda! Join us for the next round,” Cassie says. Capa looks up from where he’s reading at the edge of the room.

“I’m enjoying watching the debauchery from here,” Capa says.

“I don’t play with cheaters,” Kaneda says, mock serious. Mace snorts. 

“Suit yourself,” Cassie says. “Your loss.”

***

It’s Capa and Mace’s night on watch. They’re not officially pilots, but everyone’s been trained in the basics of everyone else’s specialty. Just in case. They have two people monitor the flight deck each night as a precaution.

The reflection of light from the console flickers patterns over Mace’s face. It’s quiet. 

“Did you have anyone?” Capa asks, “Back on Earth?”

Mace is silent for a long time. Capa can’t tell if Mace is contemplating punching him or not. It’s about a 50/50 tossup most times. 

“Tony,” Mace says finally. “He couldn’t understand why I wanted to come.”

Capa looks at him in surprise. Mace laughs, all the humor cut of out it. “Yeah, I’m a cocksucker, Capa, no need to look so shocked.”

“I’m just surprised that you told me,” Capa says. 

“Don’t think I’m all warm and fuzzy now.”

“No, I don’t think I’ll ever make that mistake,” Capa says.

***

“Today’s the day,” Kaneda says over the intercom.

“You realize that days are meaningless and a human construct, right? We’re always in direct sight of the sun,” Mace says when they’re gathered on the flight deck. Not to be an asshole, Capa realizes, or not only to be an asshole—he’s nervous. Kaneda looks at him. “Sorry,” Mace says under his breath. 

“Okay,” Kaneda says. “We’ve prepared for this moment for over seven years. You all know what to do.”

***

It’s more beautiful than Capa could have ever imagined. He has five minutes to get out of the control room of the payload and back onto Icarus II, but he almost, just for a split second, considers staying to see everything that he—everything that they have worked towards.

He gets to the observation room in time to watch the sun brighten through the shields and feel the heat of it on his skin. 

“Look at us,” Cory says quietly, “the Eight Immortals, who flew to the sun and escaped death.”

***

“Well, that was almost anticlimactic?” Cassie says after lights out, when she and Capa are sitting in her bunk and everyone else is asleep except for Trey, who’s sitting watch on the flight deck.

“We kind of just watched the sun reigniate. No big deal, I guess.” Cassie punches him in the arm. 

“Stop being a jerk. I just mean—this was a total suicide mission right? We can admit that now?”

Capa quirks his mouth. “We’re not in the clear yet,” he says. 

“Yeah, well, the trip back is going to be a cakewalk compared to what we’ve already been through.” Capa tilts his head in acknowledgment. “And now the hard part’s over and I feel—”

“Empty.”

“Yeah.”

“It’ll sink in eventually.”

“As if you’ve reignited the sun before to save humanity and had to deal with the emotional fallout.” 

Capa smiles even though he’s trying not to, and then Cassie laughs and he’s laughing too, and they collapse against each other, laughing so hard they’re crying.

“Hey assholes, some of us are trying to sleep!” Mace shouts from across the corridor. 

“Settle down, children,” Kaneda calls out.

***

They go to the observation room to let their fellow crewmembers sleep in peace, but when they get there they sit in silence for a while before Cassie asks, “Do you ever think about what would’ve happened if we’d rendezvoused with the Icarus I?”

Capa doesn’t answer for several minutes. 

“The possibilities are so infinite as to be—”

“Oh, come on, Capa, live a little. Have some imagination. What do you think would have happened?” Cassie says.

They watch the sun get imperceptibly smaller through the window. 

“Some interpretations of quantum mechanics would call for there to be a universe where we did go to the Icarus I,” Capa says. “Somewhere, in a different space and time, there’s a reality where we adjusted our course to retrieve their payload. Who knows what could have happened.” Cassie elbows him. “Okay, fine—Kaneda dies when Trey forgets to calculate the new shield angle for our adjusted trajectory and Kaneda can’t fix the damage to the shield in time, and then after we join with the Icarus I, the one surviving crewmember unknowingly boards the Icarus II and tries to kill us all and sabotage the mission since he contracted a serious case of space crazy after being out here for years alone in the chilling remoteness of the universe.” 

Cassie stares at him. 

“Kidding. I’m kidding. What’s most important,” Capa continues, “is that I think we still did it. Even though all the odds were against us. Even though we only had one shot at it. We still delivered the payload.”

He’s quiet for a moment. 

“And in the end,” Capa says, “there was light.”


End file.
